Santa Cruz Galapagos and Gauyaquil 29-31st March 2007

It was really sad that our Galapagos trip was coming to the end and we said goodbye to Sulidae, our boat. After another early start we were at the Charles Darwin Research Centre by about 7.30am. We saw baby giant tortoises that hatched out in 2006 and 2007 and also some bigger ones, including Lonesome George, the last of his species from Pinta Island.

Most species on the Galapagos islands are left alone for natural selection and the evolution of the species to continue, but the Charles Darwin Centre has a giant tortoise breeding program because humans have intervened with their population numbers. Between 100,000 and 200,000 giant tortoises were taken by explorers, pirates and fisherman and stored, stacked upside down, on the boats to provide fresh meat! The tortoises can survive for up to a year like this without any food or water.

We then were on a bus across Santa Cruz to Baltra where we caught our flight back to Guayaquil. Our hotel, the Gran Hotel Guayaquil, picked us up and we spent a couple of days resting and enjoying hot water! (there was none on our boat). Steve took another course of antibiotics!

Sante Fe and South Plaza Island Galapagos 28th march 2007

It was the last full day of the cruise. The sealions were once again lazing around on the landing area and were not too keen to move! We walked around the island of Sante Fe where there were quite a few huge cacti. We also saw some of the land iguanas; they are a separate sub-species on this island. Steve got in a bit of a mess with all the sealion poop on the beach!

We had our last snorkel, with two turtles and a ray and then swam over to where the sealions were - there were lots of playful pups in the water.

We then sailed off to the tiny island of South Plaza, just off Santa Cruz and near Gordon Rocks, where you can dive with the hammerhead sharks. There were loads more sealions and also land iguanas; we saw one rolling a cactus fruit which is what they eat. They have to roll it on the ground to break all of the spines off before they can eat it.There were lots of sea birds on the steep cliffs including a pair of white tailed tropic birds flying around.

The rest of the afternoon was spent sailing back to Puerto Ayora. Steve had just started suffering again from a dodgy stomach but at least we had been healthy for the rest of the cruise.

Floreana Galapagos 27th March 2007

When some of the passengers changed over we took the opportunity to move to the biggest cabin which had lots of windows around 180 degrees, taking up the back part of the boat. We watched the sunset and saw the sky turn a lovely colour just before the sun rose.

Our first stop was at Punta Cormorant, a green sand beach with small grains of olivine in it. We could see the grains but it wasn't actually that green overall.

There was a large lake with 40-50 flamingos spread over it. We walked to another pristine beach with rays and turtles in the shallow water, then it was off for a snorkel. We snorkelled around Devils Crown - some offshore rocks - where there were two more seals, lots of rays (mostly spotted eagle rays in groups), lots of fish and also sharks swimming below us. At the end a penguin was preening himself on the water and was completely unconcerned as our boat circled around watching him.

In the afternoon we went to Post Office Bay, had a quick snorkel then visited the post office barrel that has been there since 1793. It was set up for people to collect any post that is near to where they live which they then hand deliver. There weren´t any postcards we could deliver but we did post a few, including one to ourselves, We have had a bet and Steve thinks it will turn up on 2.9.2007 and I say 16.4.2007.

We also walked down a lava tube, it was pitch black and went all the way down to the sea.

Espanola Island Galapagos 26th March 2007

During the night we had been sailing perpendicular to the current and the boat was rocking from side to side. Luckily we weren´t sea sick but it was difficult to sleep. We had three hours of free time on a 1km long white sand beach where sea lions were sprawled out along the whole beach, and we spent an hour wandering along between them all.

We snorkelled out to some rocks and there were two sea lions in the water. The big ones can be quite scary underwater as they are much faster than us.

The food on the boat had been okay but this time in was prawns, so we didn´t eat much - it was also pineapple for dessert.

In the afternoon we were back on Espanola. We had a job getting off the dinghy as a dominant male sea lion was crashed out on the steps and walkway and didn´t want to move. There were loads of marine iguanas; on this island they had more colour - red and green, when they were laying eggs. We were lucky to see about three waved albatrosse. They are only just starting to arrive back on the island to nest - one was flying around. We saw blue footed boobies nesting, one had two two day old chicks and another was sat on two eggs. The Nazca boobies had bigger chicks. This island seemed to have it all.

Santa Cruz Galapagos 25th March 2007

Breakfast was earlier today at 6.30am. By 7.15am we were on Bachas beach. It was another fantastic white sand beach; the turtles love this one and there were lots of tracks where they had been up to lay their eggs during the night. We had a swim in the turquoise waters then had to go to Baltra as half our group had to go to the airport. We spent most of the day lazing around on deck, and eventually we had five new passengers. It wasn´t as good a group as before, as the newcomers were all French and German. One group was delayed as the aeroplane came in to land at Baltra but due to low cloud acsended again, flying all the way back to Guayaquil then back again!

In the evening we had a dinghy ride at Black Turtle Cove where the green turtles go to rest after laying there eggs, safe from killer whales. We saw some turtles and small sharks in the murky mangrove waters.

Santiago Island and Bartoleme Island, Galapagos 24th March 2007

We landed on another beautiful beach, the sun was shining again. We walked across a lava flow from 1890 that only had very few plants starting to colonise it; it was broken up but had lovely patterns in it. We snorkelled around Sullivan bay and a penguin shot past us-Steve missed it, but later in the snorkel we followed two penguins around for a while, watching them swim through a large school of fish.

On Bartoleme Island another seal came ashore to see what we were up to. We saw pelicans starting to nest and also about 30 small white tipped reef sharks about two to three foot from the water´s edge. We snorkled around Pinnacle Rock and had a close encounter with two white tipped reef sharks. Walking up to the top of the island blue footed boobies were diving into the water for fish - from about 10 metres in the air they plunge in at great speed and probably dive down about two metres.

We saw the sunset from the top of Bartoleme island with a great view of the Pinnacle Rocks and Santiago Island.

Dragon Hill and Chinese Hat, Galapagos 23rd March 2007

Breakfast was at 7am and we went ashore at 8am. We were at Dragon Hill on another part of Santa Cruz island. The first little rocky area where we landed had marine iguanas, a pelican, a lava heron, a grey heron, sally lightfoot crabs, frigate birds in the air and a few seals in the water!

We did a 2km circular walk - the sun was out and it was hot. There were a flew flamingos in the salt lake. We also saw some land iguanas, mocking birds, Darwin finches and locusts. We had a quick snorkel then sailed the short distance to Chinese Hat. We saw Galapagos penguins on the rocks. We landed on a beautiful small beach and a seal and three pups came ashore to investigate us. The pups were gorgeous and posed for photos. As we walked around there were also some female seals suckling babies. There was a beautiful sunset whilst we were still on the island.